Understanding and Reaching Muslims

Well hello and welcome to our session on how we can better understand and reach Muslim friends and neighbours and colleagues.

I'm Andy Bannister from the Solar Centre for Public Christianity and the whole topic of how we engage with Muslims has been one that I've thought about for some time.

Although I live in Scotland at the moment, I grew up in London, a very multicultural part of London, and there were Muslims all around us in my part of the city.

In fact, many of my friends at school were Muslims, and I guess back then I probably largely assumed when I was in my teens and early 20s that Christianity and Islam were kind of largely the same.

But then in my mid-20s, I began going up to a place in London called Speaker's Corner, and that's part of Hyde Park in London.

And at Speaker's Corner, anyone can stand on a ladder or a box and you can talk about anything, politics, religion, sports, you name it, get a crowd.

And I went up there with a group of Christians who were using Speaker's Corner as a vehicle to reach Muslims.

And I began dialoguing, debating with Muslims, and I got absolutely fascinated, fascinated by the differences that I really discovered between Christianity and Islam,

and really just discovered a real passion for sharing my faith with Muslims.

Now, back in that time, back in the late 1990s, most people weren't interested in Islam or in thinking about how we engage with Muslims.

The church had her focus on other things.

But in recent decades, of course, everything has changed, and particularly the UK's religious makeup has and is changing.

It's changing rapidly, especially when it comes to Islam.

Especially noteworthy are the changing immigration patterns that we see.

43% of Muslims who arrived in the UK between 2010 and 2016 were Muslim.

And according to the very well-respected Pew Research Centre, the number of Muslims here in the UK is predicted to rise to about 13 million in 30 years' time.

And so it's vital as Christians that we think missionally and evangelistically about how we engage Islam.

And so what I want to do in this talk is to unpack the Muslim worldview in a bit more detail.

What do our Muslim friends believe and why?

What are some of the implications?

What are some of the apologetic issues?

Apologetics, that branch of Christian thought concerned with giving a reason why we believe what we believe.

How do we get ourselves equipped to share our faith with Muslims?

And what are some basic principles for sharing your faith with your Muslim friends?

And there are some resources I've put together to help you get the most out of this talk.

If you go to the SOLAS website, solascpc.org forward slash Islam, download the slides from this talk.

You can get hold of information on my brand new book, The Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God, just out with IVP.

Lots of really great stuff in there and also a free e-book we have on Islam.

And this talk is really designed as an overview, a kind of view from 30,000 feet.

And we're going to cover a lot of ground at high speed, which is why I hugely recommend you visit the SOLAS website forward slash Islam.

Grab some of those resources because it will let you get the most out of this talk.

Well, we've got a lot to cover in the next 35 minutes or so.

So let's dive in and take a look at how Islam began.

And to understand Islam today, we do need to understand how it all began.

The cultural context into which Islam was birthed and Mohammed, the founder of the religion we know today as Islam.

We need to take a look at his origins as well.

Well, Islam emerged into a world of empires.

The Arabian Peninsula of the 7th century lying sandwiched between the great Byzantine and Persian empires who had been at war with each other for centuries, for years.

The Arabian Peninsula kind of lay outside of the action, a bit of a multi-ethnic and multi-religious backwater.

Arabia back then was religiously very diverse.

There were Christian groups and Jewish groups, other religions jostling around.

And it was also largely an oral culture, storytelling and poetry being the main ways that religious and cultural ideas were circulated.

And into this world, Mohammed was born sometime round about AD 570.

And according to the Muslim historians, and what follows next, I'm just basically following the standard Muslim biography of Mohammed.

More critical scholars might raise some questions about some of these dates and facts and so forth, but we'll stick with the Muslim view.

Mohammed was born, according to Muslim historians, in Mecca, a minor trading and pilgrimage site.

And the Kabar, that cube-shaped black building, to which today every Muslim prays, well, that was there before Mohammed.

It was used to host idols for a whole range of a wide range of pagan deities.

Well, as he grew up, Mohammed worked first as a shepherd and then in the caravan trading business.

At age 25, he married his wealthy caravan-owning boss, Khadija.

He was 25, she was 40, and she bore him two sons and four daughters, but only the daughters survived.

That was a pattern that would be repeated with his later wives.

In fact, Mohammed would marry something like 20 different men, women, and his failure, but none of them would provide him with a male heir.

And that arguably led to a number of succession problems after his death.

Well, Mohammed had spiritual interests, he had ascetic leanings, and as a young man, he would regularly retire into the desert for spiritual retreats and periods of reflection.

And according to the Muslim historians, it was one such sort of trip into the desert in AD 610 that the angel Gabriel appeared to him and revealed to him what is now chapter 96 of the Quran.

The Quran is not in chronological order, so Muslims believe that chapter 96 were the first verses that were revealed to Mohammed there.

And for the next 23 years, he continued to receive revelations as the angel would appear and revealed to him more and more and more of what would eventually be collected together and form the Quran.

Now, during those 23 years, Mohammed had two distinct phases to his career.

The first was in Mecca, where from 610 to 622, he began his ministry, largely in his message claiming to be like the biblical prophets only sent to the Arabs.

And his message was threefold.

He talked about monotheism, he talked about social justice, and he warned of the punishments in hell for those who refused to listen.

And he gained a few converts, but not very many.

The main thing Mohammed gained in this part of his ministry was, in fact, opposition.

Opposition to him grew quickly in Mecca, eventually leading to outright persecution.

And that became so bad that in the end, Mohammed and his followers had to flee for their lives.

And so it was in AD 622 that the early Muslims, a few hundred of them, migrated a couple of hundred miles north from Mecca up to Medina.

And that date actually marks the start of the Muslim calendar.

It's known as the immigration or the hijrah in Arabic.

And Muslims date their calendar.

Their year one dates from our year 622.

And that move to Medina is incredibly significant.

One reason why, in fact, Muslims date their calendar from it.

A very significant Mohammed's time in Medina, if we want to understand why Islam looks the way that it does today.

For it was at Medina, though Mohammed makes the transition from being a prophet to being a statesman.

He gained control of the city.

And that was accompanied by a shift in the character of his revelations.

Now Mohammed begins to claim that God was revealing to him new laws for a new nation with him in charge of it.

And this has a number of implications.

For example, it's at Medina that we first see the beginnings of jihad or holy war.

With a number of verses of the Koran, allowing for at first offensive use of battle, defensive rather,

and then later offensive use of battle to further the Muslim cause.

Following a number of military interactions with the Meccans, Mohammed finally conquers his home city in 630 AD

and spends the last two years of his life bringing the whole Arabian peninsula under his control.

Before he died in 632.

Now that really is a totally high-speed whistle-stop tour of Mohammed's life.

But it's helpful to even understand that basic framework for a couple of reasons.

Firstly, for Muslims, of course, the Koran is deeply bound up with Mohammed's life.

For Sunni Muslims, the largest sect of Islam in particular,

if they want to understand what a particular verse of the Koran means,

they will read it through the filter of Mohammed's life.

They will ask, what was Mohammed doing when that verse was revealed?

And thus they can interpret it today.

And then, of course, secondly, for Muslims of all varieties,

although Mohammed is only a man, he is still the supreme example, they believe, of humankind.

And they want to study his life and try and emulate his life, his teaching, his practice, and so on.

And really, history in Islam casts long shadows.

And we cannot fully understand Islam and the issues around it today without understanding how it really began,

and especially the centrality of Mohammed in the middle of it.

Well, let's now turn from Mohammed and the origins of Islam to the core beliefs of Islam.

And one of the things that sometimes confuses people and feeds this sort of belief we see in many places

that Muslims and Christians believe the same thing is the fact that Muslims will use the same words as Christians do,

but mean different things by them.

Don't assume that because your Muslim friend speaks of words like God, faith, scripture, revelation, or so on,

they mean the same thing by that word that we do.

We should always ask your Muslim friend, hey, you know, we use that word too, but tell me, what do you mean by it?

It's also worth noting, incidentally, as we move into talking about Muslim beliefs,

that for our Muslim friends, belief often comes a close second to practice.

The five pillars of Islam, if you've studied anything on Islam, read a book, or, you know,

had classes, religious studies sort of stuff at school or university or whatever,

you'll probably come across the five pillars of Islam, the five things that Muslims have to do to be a Muslim.

And in fact, it's been remarked, in fact, that Islam is far more a religion characterized by practice than by belief.

In fact, somebody once remarked that, you know, in Christianity, what we have really is complex beliefs and very simple practices.

Not a lot of things you have to do to be a Christian, but some things you have to believe.

Islam always reverses that.

And Islam are very simple beliefs, very, very, very few things you actually have to believe,

but quite complex things you have to do.

But Islam, like Christianity, sets out to be a worldview that's a complete understanding of reality.

And the same with other worldviews attempt to understand reality,

be they worldviews like atheism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, or indeed Christianity.

And all worldviews set out to answer some fairly basic questions.

In fact, I go into this in some detail, actually, in the third chapter of my book,

Do Muslims and Christians Worship the Same God?

From where I'm drawing some of this material here today.

But there are some basic questions that worldviews try to answer.

And here are four that I think are quite helpful.

Worldviews try to answer questions like, is there a God?

And if so, what is he like?

What does it mean to be human?

What's the problem?

What's gone wrong with the world?

And what is the solution?

And interestingly, on every one of those core questions,

Islam and Christianity are utterly different.

There's a common misconception in our culture that the world's major religions,

and certainly Islam and Christianity, are the same,

which is why I wrote the book I just mentioned.

Many people think it doesn't matter sort of what you believe,

as well as you're sincere.

I hear this on university campuses all the time.

But Islam offers us a very good test case in the case of that question.

Because as you look at Islam, you suddenly discover, very quickly discover,

how profoundly different Islam and Christianity are from each other,

how their worldview answers are not just sort of slightly different,

but they're radically different.

They're miles apart from each other.

And to show you that, what I want to do is survey the core beliefs of Islam.

And as we do, we'll see how they fuel Islam's answers to those four worldview questions.

And according to the classical creeds of Islam,

Muslims are committed, are commanded to believe in five core beliefs.

Belief in God, belief in angels, belief in scripture,

belief in prophets, and belief in the day of judgment.

So let's explore these briefly one by one.

Let's start with belief in God.

Muslims believe that God, who they call Allah, is utterly, indivisibly one,

which is one reason, incidentally,

why they tend to believe that Christians are polytheists,

because we believe in the Trinity.

Muslims mishear that and think that we believe in three gods.

The Quran, as it describes who Allah, the God of Islam is,

puts a major emphasis on God's power.

Listen to these words from the 112th chapter of the Quran,

which is often considered to be the Quran's most succinct description

of who the Quranic God is.

Say, he is Allah, the one and only.

He is Allah, the eternal, the absolute.

He begetteth not, nor is he begotten, nor is there any,

and there is none like unto him.

Notice the emphasis there on God's power.

He's eternal.

He's absolute.

But also notice the little dig at Christians there.

He begetteth not, nor is he begotten.

Well, the Quran also frequently stresses Allah's utter transcendence.

He's distant.

He's high.

He's lofty.

He's remote.

He's removed.

In the Quran, he really reveals only his will,

not his character or his nature or himself.

So that really, a Muslim's relationship with God is one of obedience,

like a slave to a master, not a close personal relationship.

And so in terms of the first worldview question,

is there a God and who is he like?

Well, Islam would answer, yes, of course, there's a God.

And who is he?

Well, he's ruler.

He's creator.

He's Lord.

He's master.

He certainly is not father, saviour, or friend.

In fact, no relationship is really possible with the God of the Quran.

Nowhere does the Quran invite its readers into a relationship with Allah.

He tends to sort of govern the world like a distant ruler,

like a bit of an absent landlord, actually, quite honestly.

So from belief in God, the second belief of Muslims we're going to look at,

according to the classical creeds of Islam, belief in angels.

And angels form a core part of the Islamic belief system,

far more so than in Christianity,

where many Christians I spent we get through much of our lives

without really thinking that much about angels.

But in Islam, angels are central.

It is angels who brought revelation.

Remember the story of how Muhammad received the Quran according to Islamic beliefs?

It wasn't God who revealed the Quran to Muhammad,

but it was the angel Gabriel.

It's angels who bring revelation down from heaven to the prophets.

It's angels who, according to Islamic tradition,

watch over your every deed.

According to Islamic tradition,

every person has two recording angels,

one sitting on the right shoulder,

one on the left,

who record your good deeds,

your bad deeds,

so they can be weighed on the day of judgment.

And all this means that angels are sort of everyday reality,

really, for faithful Muslims,

far more part of their belief and faith and practice.

And this centrality of angels in Islam rather than Christianity,

I think actually flows from beliefs about Allah.

Because Allah is so distant and remote and transcendent,

angels have kind of come into the gap that's being created between humans and God.

It's angels who interact with the earthly realm,

and angels who, for the lowly Muslim,

form his or her point of contact with the spiritual realm.

So think about the second worldview question.

What does it mean to be human?

And who are humans in Islam?

Well, Islam would answer humans are slaves

who must be constantly kind of watched

to ensure that we're obedient,

because they're forgetful and they go wrong in all kinds of ways.

And the Quran is very clear.

Also, of course, that Allah only shows favor

to those who first obediently act towards him.

All the initiative is on our side.

There is no sense in the Quran

that God loves or takes initiative in reaching sinners.

The Quran says in chapter 3, verse 31,

if you love Allah, follow me.

Allah will love and then forgive you your sins.

And it's the role of angels to keep an eye on human beings in the Quran

to make sure they're following all of that out.

What a contrast, I always say.

What a contrast.

The God of the Bible,

who in Romans 5, verse 8,

Romans 5:8

we're told loved us first

and demonstrated that,

that even while we're still sinners,

he sent Jesus to die for us.

So from belief in God and belief in angels,

let's turn to scripture,

the third belief in the classical Muslim creed.

So Muslims believe that Allah has revealed his will to human beings

by sending books with his prophets.

And indeed, they believe that every prophet

brought some sort of book or written revelation.

Not all have survived,

but the Quran does speak of the Torah sent to Moses,

the Psalms or the Zabor in Arabic sent to David,

the Injil or the Gospel sent to Jesus,

and of course, the Quran talks about itself,

the Quran, Allah's final revelation sent to Muhammad.

In fact, the Quran speaks very positively

about those former scriptures,

but Muslims believe that, of course,

it's the Quran that is God's final word,

and many Muslims have been taught to believe

that the former scriptures have been corrupted

and that only the Quran is reliable.

But there are some distinct differences

in what Muslims believe about scripture.

They believe that scripture consists

of the first person direct speech of God.

If you were to open the Quran and read it,

you would notice that every verse

is sort of God speaking in the first person.

And that's useful to know

because it can cause Muslims confusion

when they encounter the Bible.

A Muslim who comes to the Bible

and opens it expecting to find it like the Quran

can get confused by the different genres there

in the Bible, you know, history, biography,

poetry, lore, drama, song, and prophecy.

I've seen Muslims sometimes, you know,

open the New Testament and say things like,

well, you know, I can see books written

by Matthew and Mark and Luke and John.

Where is the book that Jesus wrote?

Where's the book that God wrote?

Because they're approaching the Bible

expecting to find it identical to the Quran.

So if you've got a Muslim friend

and you're going to do, say, a Bible study with them,

help them understand what Christians think

about scripture, how it works.

Another major difference, incidentally,

concerns the content of scripture.

The Quran very much is about Allah revealing his will.

You know, here's what Allah wants you to do.

Here are the commands you should follow.

But he never reveals his character or himself.

Remember, we have a God who is remote and transcendent

and ultimately unknowable.

And so the Quran is largely concerned

with God's will and commands.

Also, it's concerned with those,

because of its answers,

its third and fourth world view question.

The third and fourth world view question,

what's the problem?

What's gone wrong with the world?

And of course, what's the solution?

And Islam would reply to that,

well, the problem is that human beings are weak

and they're forgetful.

What they need is more information

in the form of commandments.

It's really important to understand

that the Quran doesn't really talk about salvation.

Islam doesn't really offer you salvation.

The Quran offers really a self-help program.

You know, the problem is you forget God's commands.

Here are some more of them.

Whereas Christianity, of course,

there's no something much more drastic has gone wrong.

And there's a much more drastic solution needed.

Let's turn to the penultimate belief of Islam,

belief in prophets.

Like Christians, Muslims believe that God

has sent messengers, prophets to mankind.

But there really the similarity ends.

For Muslims believe some pretty different things

about prophets.

For example, the traditional Islamic belief

is that prophets are sinless,

protected by Allah from any wrongdoing.

And hence, Muslims actually have quite a difficult time

with stories in the Bible,

such as David's sin with Bathsheba.

I've had Muslim friends say,

look, there's proof the Bible's been corrupted

because there's a story of David and Bathsheba

and David as a prophet.

How could he possibly have done that?

Because they're reading it through that lens.

And again, knowing that's what might be,

could be going on in the head of your Muslim friend

is helpful as you help them think about

what the Bible says.

Muslims also believe there is a line of prophets,

beginning with Adam, who was the last prophet,

and then ending with Muhammad,

of the first prophet,

and then ending with Muhammad,

who was the last and the seal of the line of prophets.

And among that long line of prophets,

many mentioned in the Quran,

you'll find many biblical prophets.

The Quran mentions many biblical prophets,

although often with Arabized names,

people like Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses,

David, and Jesus, and so on.

And according to Islam,

you see every prophet brought essentially the same message,

the unity of God

and a call to obedience and moral commands.

And again, moral commands.

Think of the last worldview question,

what's the solution?

Well, Islam would answer moral commands.

Human beings need instruction,

instruction, instruction.

You know, Islam really is a moral self-improvement plan.

And by contrast,

Christianity is a heart transformation plan.

And in the seventh chapter

of how the Muslims and Christians worship the same God,

again, I go into this in some detail, actually,

and talk about the massive difference

between Islam and Christianity here,

because Islam just thinks we need advice.

Christianity thinks we actually need a rescuer.

And there's a massive, you know,

world of difference between those two positions.

And then we come to the fifth belief,

belief of the classical Muslim creeds,

the day of judgment.

Muslims believe at the end of time

that God will wrap up history,

those who have died will be raised,

and all will face judgment.

And it's important to understand the major role

that the day of judgment forms

for many of our Muslim friends

in the Islamic worldview.

For many Muslims, you know,

judgment is an ever-looming reality,

and they are deeply concerned

about not being found wanting on that day.

You know, it's interesting, isn't it?

You know, 100 or 200 years ago,

there was a lot more preaching

about judgment and hell in Christian churches.

Today, a lot of churches have kind of ranged that in,

and you don't kind of hear

those kind of messages anymore.

But boy, read the Quran,

warnings of hellfire everywhere.

Read, hear many Muslim sermons,

hellfire everywhere.

Muslims take this stuff seriously,

and maybe we need to rethink

about taking this stuff seriously too.

I find it quite helpful something

to say to Muslim friends as we discuss,

look, you know, I, like you, I believe in hell.

I don't want to go there,

and I don't want you to go there.

The reason I want to tell you about Jesus

is I think he is the only way

we can avoid spending an eternity

separated from God,

an eternity in the torments of hell.

I don't want that for you.

I would never use that approach

for my atheist friends,

but with my Muslim friends,

it can immediately establish you

as someone who takes

these spiritual things seriously.

Well, as I reflect

on the four worldview questions,

is there a God,

and who is he like?

You know, who are we?

What's the problem?

What's gone wrong with the world?

And then lastly,

what's the solution?

And then I look at the differences

that I've just so briefly shown you

in the Islamic answer.

You know, one of the biggest differences

that I see in Islam

is lack of hope.

There is no hope in Islam.

You know, Islam can't really offer,

doesn't offer any promise of forgiveness.

God might, if you take the initiative,

he might show you favor.

He might not.

There's no indwelling power

of the Holy Spirit

to actually transform us.

And ultimately,

there's no savior

who's come to rescue us.

You are left on your own.

And if your life is enough of a mess

that you can't make it on your own,

then you're in real trouble.

And also, I often say

to my Muslim friends,

you know, ultimately,

of course,

moral commands can't save us.

You know, most of us

don't have a problem

knowing the right thing to do.

We know the right thing to do.

What we lack is the power to do it.

Islam doesn't help you over that.

Islam simply says,

you know, you're fools.

You've messed this lot of commands up.

Have some more.

Try harder.

Christianity says,

no, actually,

there is something broken

in the very heart of human nature

that needs more

than just more instructions.

Well, for all of that background,

of course,

Muslims present

a particularly challenge

to Christianity

because, of course,

they also take a pretty often

quite highly polemical approach

to Christianity.

And this means that

if you're going to share your faith

or talk about your faith

with a Muslim friend,

neighbor, colleague,

or classmate,

it might just be worth knowing

some of the questions

or objections

that may be raised

to your faith

so you can respond.

And as I said,

there's a wonderful discipline

with a long history

in Christianity

called apologetics.

In recent years,

that goes back

through people like,

you know,

C.S. Lewis

and Josh McDowell

or Rebecca McLaughlin

writing today.

Many others have written

in this area.

And apologetics

is simply a branch

of Christian thought

concerned with giving

a reason for the hope

that we have

as 1 Peter 3.15 commands us.

And I think in the multicultural age

that we live in,

every Christian

needs to know a little bit

about how they can

defend their faith

and persuade,

give people a persuasive reason

to follow Christ.

But in terms of responding

to the challenges of Islam,

there are three areas

that Muslim attacks

against Christianity,

Muslim polemics

often focus on.

Muslims will often

talk about the Bible,

they'll often talk

about the Trinity,

and they'll often talk

about Christian history.

And again,

we can only just touch

on these in our last

10 minutes or so.

But let me just give you

a few highlights

of what you might hear

and a way you might respond.

So in terms of the Bible,

many Muslims believe

the Bible has been corrupted.

Now, interestingly,

that was a polemic,

an argument,

that developed quite late

in Islamic history.

So the Quran's quite positive

about the Bible.

But as Muslims began

to discover the Bible,

when Muhammad was preaching,

the Bible was not

widely available in Arabic.

He said that he was preaching

the same message,

nobody could check.

But as Islam began expanding

and building an empire

after Muhammad's death,

very quickly,

Muslims began debating

with Christians,

they began reading the Bible,

and they discovered

horror of horrors

that the Bible

contradicted the Quran.

And this posed

a massive problem.

Muhammad claimed

to be a prophet

like the biblical prophets,

but his message

was entirely different.

So this really forced

Muslim clerics

in those first couple

of centuries

to a choice.

Either they had to claim

their prophet got it wrong,

which is pretty much unthinkable,

or they had to claim

that Jews and Christians

had corrupted the Bible,

and that was the route

they took.

And it can be helpful

for our Muslim friends

to know the history

behind this argument.

Now, there are numerous ways

to respond to Muslim attacks here,

but I've sometimes found it helpful

to address the theological problem

this raises for Muslims.

And it simply looks like this.

What kind of God,

I ask Muslim friends,

would send books

with all of his prophets

from Adam

through Moses

and Abraham

all the way down to Jesus,

and would allow,

what kind of God

would allow

every single one of those

to get lost,

destroyed,

or corrupted,

before finally that God,

what,

round about 610 AD,

goes,

oh gosh,

you know,

I wish I'd thought of this before,

perhaps I need to send a book

at last that's incorruptible,

and he sends it

there with Muhammad.

And of course,

even the Quran

has textual variants

in its manuscript tradition,

so, you know,

the debate about

whether it's being preserved

is a whole other issue.

But what kind of God

behaves that way?

What kind of God

literally can't protect

his own word

because he isn't powerful enough,

or can't be bothered to

because he doesn't care enough?

And quite frankly,

that's the kind of God

who isn't competent

to run a burger stand,

quite frankly,

let alone a universe.

By contrast,

the God of the Bible

says that my word

stands forever.

Well, then,

there's the Trinity.

Muslims, of course,

have a hard time

with the Trinity

because the Quran

stresses the unity of God

so frequently

and so starkly,

and so many Christians,

many Muslims rather,

tend to think that Christians

actually believe in three gods

that were basically

polytheists.

Now,

there are so many ways

you could respond here.

There's some brilliant books

that you can read

to help you understand

the Trinity better.

My friend Mike Reeves

has written a wonderful book

called Delighting in the Trinity

that's well worth a read.

But again,

the most helpful way

initially,

I find with Muslims here,

is turn the question

around a bit

and to say to them,

look,

often Muslims ask the question,

how can a man be God?

But that's actually

the wrong way around.

Isn't it a better question

to ask,

could God

take on human form

if he wished to?

Now,

Muslims will often

shy away from us

saying God

couldn't do this

because they don't like

to limit God that way.

And once you've got

to that point,

you can say,

well,

okay,

once we're agreed

that God could do this

should he wish to,

then the question becomes,

has God done this?

And what a great invitation

to take a long,

hard look at the Gospels

and the claims

that Jesus made

for himself.

So there's the Bible,

there's a Trinity.

One last area

where Muslims

may sometimes

raise some questions

is the whole issue

of history

and particularly,

you know,

examples of Christians

behaving badly in history.

A common target

is the Crusades

or colonialism,

you know,

which has cast a long shadow

really over Muslim-Christian

relations.

Now,

when it comes to the Crusades,

there are certainly

many approaches

that one can make,

but I sometimes find it helpful

to just take this approach

really because it's

so Jesus-centered.

You can say to a Muslim friend,

look,

if a Christian commits violence,

it's very simple,

they're disobeying Jesus.

You can point them

to the words of Jesus

who said,

love your enemies

and pray for those

who persecute you.

And then you say,

tell me,

when a Muslim commits violence

in the name of Islam,

what words of Muhammad

would you point them to

as a critique?

Can you show me

where Muhammad said,

love your enemies

and pray for those

who persecute you?

And you simply,

you can't

because Muhammad

was a military leader.

He was a warlord

as well as a founder

of a world religion.

And then thirdly,

of course,

most Christians

would condemn

the bloodshed

of the Crusades,

where I have not yet

found any mainstream writer

who has condemned

the military expansion

Islam engaged in

in its first few centuries.

And this applies

to colonialism too,

actually.

We hear a lot of critique today

of the colonial period

in British history,

and many of those critiques

are fair enough,

but we don't often hear

that every other civilization

built great empires

and Islam had a great empire.

Islam conquered North Africa.

Islam conquered Spain.

Islam conquered much of Asia.

And today,

many Muslims are taught

that was the golden period

of Islam.

They don't engage

in a reflective critique

of their own tradition.

You know,

look along North Africa.

Why is a country like Morocco

that I've been to many times,

why is that a Muslim country?

Why are the Burba people,

the original people

in that country,

forced to, you know,

living in small,

scattered communities

up in the mountains?

Because it was conquered

by Islam.

In the centuries

following Muhammad

and Islam has never

really come to terms

with its colonial past.

I think we can raise

those kind of questions,

but do so not to score

political points,

but to bring it back to Jesus.

On which note,

that brings me

to my final section

in my last five minutes

with you in this talk.

And I want to think

a little bit about

some principles for evangelism.

Because as we engage

with Muslims,

we don't just want

to build friendships.

We don't just want

to learn more

about what our Muslim friends believe.

And we certainly don't

want to just try

and score points

and arguments.

But we want to point

people to Jesus.

How do we do this?

Well, let me share with you

very simply

four very brief principles

for reaching Muslims.

And the first is straightforward.

Go where Muslims are.

You know,

we live in a multicultural society

where many of us

may have Muslim

neighbours,

Muslim colleagues,

fellow students at school

if you're a student.

And so meeting Muslims

is not difficult for us,

but we can still live

quite separate lives.

So my encouragement to you,

if you have Muslim neighbours

in your community,

if there are Muslims

you meet at the school gate,

if you're a parent,

if there are Muslim students

at school or university,

Muslim colleagues at work,

find an opportunity

to introduce yourself.

Be proactive

in making friends

with them.

Take your opportunity

the day you can.

Don't wait for them

to come to you.

Go to them.

Secondly, friendship.

Any evangelism we engage in

should be seeking

to build long-term relationships,

not just perform

hit-and-run operations

with the gospel.

And this is especially true

when it comes to Muslims

because for a whole range

of reasons,

Muslims can often be

quite suspicious

of Christianity

and there can be

long and ancient prejudices.

Hospitality too

is an important virtue

in Muslim culture

as a way of building

deep friendships.

And it's in the context

of deep friendships

that Muslims can see

the gospel lived out

and the difference

Jesus makes day to day.

So prayerfully

and practically

seek to make friends

with the Muslims

that you come across

and invest time

into them.

Thirdly, ask challenging

questions.

Questions are a great

evangelistic tool.

Jesus used them all the time.

But learn to ask good questions.

Ask questions about Muhammad

and the Quran.

As you read stuff

and study stuff

and you come across issues,

raise those kind of questions.

Most Muslims have probably

never heard tough questions

about what they believe.

And you can do this

without being,

you know, insulting.

You don't need to deliberately

insult Muhammad

or the Quran.

But you can still ask things

like, well, I was reading

the Quran and I, you know,

came across what to me

looked like a contradiction.

Or you could say,

what about Muhammad's

many battles, you know,

today when we need

a paradigm for peace?

What's going on there?

And so on.

And if you ask those questions

in the context

of a friendship,

you are far less likely

to cause offence

and you open up

the invitation for questions

to be asked back.

I've often said to Muslims

when I've had conversations

with them, look,

there is no question

that you can ask me

about Christianity

that I'll be offended by.

And don't be afraid

of the questions either.

If a Muslim friend

asks you a question

you don't know,

just say, you know,

that's a great question.

I don't immediately

have the answer to that.

Let me get back to you.

And either go and, you know,

do an internet search,

read a book,

or, you know,

talk to a pastor

or older Christian leader

who can help you

get the answer

to the question

your Muslim friend

has asked.

And then, fourthly,

you can go where Muslims are,

friendship,

challenging questions.

Lastly, keep centred

on Jesus.

Now, I cannot stress enough

how sharing your faith

with a Muslim friend

or neighbour or colleague

is not about winning arguments.

It's very easy

to get into arguments

because Muslims

can be passionate people,

but it's about

introducing them to Jesus.

You know,

all the Muslims

I have known

who have come to faith

in Christ

have done so

when they've encountered

Jesus for the first time.

and they've grasped

who he really, really is.

In fact,

one of the most powerful testimonies

I know of a Muslim

who's come to faith

in Christ in recent years

was written by my friend

Nabil Qureshi

and it's a book called

Seeking Allah,

Finding Jesus.

It's linked, actually,

on the webpage of resources

that we've put together

for you

and I'll put that URL up

in a minute at the end.

Do check it out

because, again,

at the heart of it is Jesus.

When Muslims discover

who Jesus really is,

they'll take spiritual steps forward.

And so, therefore,

I would recommend

when talking with a Muslim

that you always bring it back

to Jesus,

whether it's comparing him

and Muhammad,

whether it's talking about

what he's done in your life

or what he was like,

what the Bible says about him,

keep it Jesus-focused.

And my prayer is that

as you do that,

that God will use you

through those friendships

to bring many Muslims

to discover who Jesus is

for themselves.

On which note,

let me pray for you.

Father God,

thank you for the opportunity

we've had to just think

about this massive topic

of how we reach

and understand

our Muslim friends.

And I pray for my friends

who've been watching this

that it would really

have sunk deeply,

there'll be things here

that will be helpful to them.

But I especially pray

for boldness and confidence

that you would help them

reach out at work,

at the school gate,

at school or university

in the neighbourhood.

Bring Muslims

across their path,

I pray,

and give them boldness

to build friendships,

a heart of compassion,

to just use hospitality

and other ways

to build bridges to them,

and just the confidence

and the compassion

to share who Jesus is

with them.

Lord, we thank you

for the work that you're doing

among Muslims,

both here in the UK

and around the world.

And I pray that through

some of those

who are watching this,

they would have the privilege

of seeing you work

in the lives

of their Muslim friends too.

We ask this

in the name of Jesus.

Amen.

Well, there,

as we close,

thank you for listening.

I hope you found this helpful.

There, as we close,

is the resource slide.

One last time,

do go to

solas-cpc.

That's the

Solas for Centre for Public Christianity

for whom I work.

solas-cpc.org

forward slash Islam.

You can download the slides

from this talk

and go through them again

at your own speed.

There's the free e-book,

Islam in Context,

that I co-wrote with a friend.

And then there's my new book,

The Muslims and Christians

Worship the Same Gods.

You can read the first chapter

of that or listen to it

if you prefer an audio book

free of charge online.

Check it out.

And if it's helpful,

there are links

to lots of different places

you can get hold of it.

And once again,

thank you for watching

and I hope you found this helpful

and a real resource

in terms of how you can reach Muslims

that the Lord brings

across your path.

Thanks again

and goodbye.